The Branch of LNMA
Museum of Romans Suta and Aleksandra Beļcova
(Riga, 57a Elizabetes Street, Apt. 26, 5th floor)

Since October 2008, art enthusiasts enjoy the oportunity of a more exhaustive insight into the creative career of two significant Latvian artists: a branch of Latvian National Museum of Art, the Museum of Romans Suta and Aleksandra Beļcova has opened its doors at the historical flat of these two prominent figures.

PERSONALITIES
The idea of the museum was cherished and developed by Sutas and Beļcova's daughter, the ballet dancer, art historian and TV journalist Tatjana Suta (1923-2004) who throughout her life, painstakingly preserved and popularised her parents' artistic legacy which she bequeathed to Latvian National Museum of Art.

The new museum is dedicated to two prominent figures in the history of Latvian art - representatives of Classical Modernism. Romans Suta (1896-1944) was a brilliantly creative and multitalented person who painted, designed and illustrated books, designed stage and film sets as well as headed his own art workshop, published essays on art and developed a concept of a national constructivist design style which he implemented by founding his Baltars porcelain painting workshop and designing furniture and interior decors.

Aleksandra Beļcova (1892-1981) was a charming and elegant lady - both a modern and liberated woman of her time and one of the first professional female artists in Latvia. Her works dated from the 1920s-1930s - cubist landscapes, constructivist still-lifes, portraits and porcelain paintings created at the Baltars workshop - attract with their high artistic quality and the original execution.

In Suta and Beļcova's trips to Europe they found themselves among German and Russian artists who were constructivists and established a close relationship with a number of modern artists - Amedee Ozanfant, Le Corbusier, Louis Marcoussis, Juan Gris, etc.

COLLECTION
The collection of the Museum of Romans Suta and Aleksandra Beļcova comprises some 4500 works of art including paintings, hand-painted porcelain plates, ink drawings, watercolours as well as porcelain, costume and stage set sketches, authentic furniture, household objects and archive materials: photographs, letters, exhibition catalogues and other documents.

DISPLAY
The display of the Museum of Romans Suta and Aleksandra Beļcova (designed by the manager of the museum Baiba Vanaga, curator of collection Nataļja Jevsejeva and the artist Anna Heinrihsone) was set up as a narrative of three aspects of the two artists' life: their art, social activities and family.

The display - a staged interior of the two artists' home - features a number of brilliant works of art by Romans Suta and Aleksandra Beļcova, mementos (for instance, a powder-box and a pipe), characeristic photographs, informative documents (including letters and journals). Visitors are welcome to browse selected copies of books illustriated by the artists, the Ho-Ho satirical magazine, studies of stage desings and porcelain paintings by Suta and other materials and watch footage from Kaugrieši feature film (1941, director Voldemārs Pūce) featuring Romans Suta and TV programmes on art, presented by Tatjana Suta, thus enhancing the sense of presence of the personalities.

EVENTS
There are plans to use the Museum of Romans Suta and Aleksandra Beļcova as a venue for gathering of people taking interest in various cultural processes. To this end, museum host events covering the areas in which both artists and their family worked: visual and applied arts, theatre, cinema, art history, television, music, etc.